“Out on the Coast” Publication: Automotive Daily News Byline: John C. Wetmore Dateline: Los Angeles, California Date: 27 August 1925

Los Angeles, Aug. 26.—It surely is good luck that the Automotive Daily News is again bringing me in close personal touch with my old friends back East, through a daily letter to them in my columns. It will be next to coming back home to chat each day with the boys along New York's Row as I did for 17 years through my column in the old Evening Mail.

No less a pleasure will it be to renew old friendships and acquaintances wil the men of the Middle West manufacturing trade. In telling them of the wonderful opportunities of the Pacific region as a present and prospective automotive market perhaps from time to time I may be able to point out specific chances for the expansion of their business in the great and growing far West. I hope so.

California's motor car sales continue to climb. Since the trade turning point came in April monthly registration figures for new passenger cars have continued to show gains over the corresponding month of 1924—9 per cent. in April, 23 per cent. in May, and 21 per cent. in June.

If there was a buying let up in the East in July, as reported, due to awaiting the arrival of the 1926 models, there has been no such slow-down in the Golden State, which registered in that month 19,227 new passenger cars, a gain of 4,594 or 31 per cent. over July, 1924.

Ten makes contributed 76 per cent. to the total sales and 340 more than the entire gain in the state. They follow in the order of their total sales gains:—

Incidentally Californians have good reason to point with pride to the facet that this year the Golden State up to August 1, had reported registration of 1,350,517 motor vehicles, which is already in excess of the entire 1924 total. This places California second to New York. Last year the Empire led the Golden State by only 70,000.

Including the ten leaders in gains thirty-one makes showed increases in registrations, 17 makes contributing the losses.

The ten leaders in sales were: Ford, 5,424; Chevrolet, 2,731; Star, 1,671; Dodge, 1,391; Essex, 1,136; Hudson, 901; Studebaker, 842; Buick, 714; Chrysler, 548; Overland, 457.

Thanks to Jack Clark, the New York Peerless manager, I happen to have at hand new passenger car registration figures for the Metropolitan district up to the end of May and out of curiosity have compared them with California registrations for this five month's period and find the score 75,075 to 49,668 in favor of California, which has only about half the population of Greater New York.